Syria: barrel bombs 'kill 87 children' in Aleppo

Monday, 23 December 2013 20:46

More than 300 people, 87 of them children, have been killed in a week of air raids on the northern Syrian city of Aleppo and nearby towns by President Bashar al-Assad's forces, a monitoring group said on Monday.

Many were killed by so-called barrel bombs dropped from helicopters, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Syrian authorities say they are battling rebels who have controlled parts of Syria's biggest city and most of the surrounding countryside for the past 18 months.

But human rights groups have condemned the use of the improvised bombs â oil drums packed with explosives and metal fragments, and rolled out of the aircraft cargo bay â as indiscriminate bombardment.

Rami Abdulrahman, director of the British-based pro-opposition Observatory, said 87 children were among the 301 people killed.